Play Dough Science Activity

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Play dough activities are practically written into our preschool curriculum. We love to stamp letters into play dough, create interesting new animals, squeeze it through play dough extruders, and even give it as gifts! This play dough science activity is one part dramatic play, one part science, and a whole lot of fun!

What You Need For The Play Dough Science Activity

Setting up the Play Dough Science Activity

I used several of our primary science tools (petri dish, test tubes, graduated cylinder, etc.), and filled them with play dough in a science-y (yup, I just made that word up 😉 ) manner. I made the orange color flow out of test tube like lava, the blue bubble up with spheres, and other random colors squished down in the petri dish.

Note: I did this activity with play dough that we’ve had for a while and had already been mixed together. If color mixing play dough is on your “you shall not do” list, you may want to address this rule right away.

Other fun props to add to this activity would be a lab coat, goggles, and magnifying glasses. These really bring the dramatic play aspect of the activity to life!

Doing the Play Dough Science Activity

After setting up the scene, there’s nothing left to do but call the kiddos over and let them explore! My kids enjoyed pretending they were mad scientists. The flowing lava, the green “slime,” the cylinder of water…it was all part of a grand (play) experiment for them!

Besides having fun pretending to be scientists, kids are actually doing a lot of other learning in this activity, too! They are learning the names of scientific instruments (and how to use them), they are measuring (using the graduated cylinder), they are working their fine motor skills (manipulating play dough and using tweezers in the activity), and much more!

More Science Activities and Ideas

Walking Water Science for Kids

Science Notebook

Plants Unit

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Clarissa Hooper

Clarissa is a former elementary teacher turned homeschool mom and blogger at Munchkins and Moms. She loves to share creative preschool activities that are both playful and educational.